Quirky wedding readings for cool couples

Your wedding is a chance to really show who you are as a couple. Forget about traditions or things you ‘think’ you have to do, we believe the best weddings are the ones where you stay true to yourself. Whether that’s choosing a unique barn wedding venue, like The Hall Barns in Leicestershire, or having your dog as your best man (heck YES), your big day should celebrate you guys in the most authentic way possible. 

We’ve been lucky enough to host some awesome weddings at our quirky barn venue and love how our couples set the tone from the very start, with cool wedding readings for their unique ceremonies. Let’s be honest, we’ve all sat through wedding ceremonies where the same readings come up again and again. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s fun to choose something a little different. Looking for some non-cheesy, alternative wedding readings inspo? Here are some of our favourite unusual wedding readings, including songs, book extracts and quotes from films, just perfect for a super-cool barn venue. 

Harry’s speech from When Harry Met Sally

I love that you get cold when it’s seventy-one degrees out
I love that it takes you an hour-and-a-half to order a sandwich 
I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you’re looking at me like I’m nuts 
I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes 
And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night
And it’s not because I’m lonely, and it’s not because it’s New Year’s Eve 
I came here tonight because when you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody…
You want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

Grow Old With You from The Wedding Singer

I wanna make you smile whenever you’re sad
Carry you around when your arthritis is bad
All I wanna do is grow old with you

I’ll get your medicine when your tummy aches
Build you a fire if the furnace breaks
Oh, it could be so nice, growing old with you

I’ll miss you
Kiss you
Give you my coat when you are cold

Need you
Feed you
Even let you hold the remote control

So let me do the dishes in our kitchen sink
Put you to bed when you’ve had too much to drink
Oh, I could be the man who grows old with you
I wanna grow old with you.

I’d Rather Rise In Love With You By Jana Lynne Umipig

I don’t want sweet nothings whispered in my ears
I’d rather be confronted by the savoury somethings
That truths communicated – in fullness and compassion bring

I don’t want long gazes or to get lost in your eyes
I‘d rather have our eyes brave exploration
Discovering every part of each other –
Every wrinkle and tint and shade
Every scar and marking that our livings have made

I don’t want to feel I knew you in another life
Or that I dreamed you in my sleep
I’d rather learn you piece by piece in reality
I’d rather you teach me how the you today
Is better than before
And I want my new self to love you more
As I Love me more

I don’t want to be attached, or taken, or spoken for
I don’t want to make each other whole
I’d rather be two whole beings
Mind, Body and Soul
I don’t want to believe you do not choose who you Love
That you just know when you do
Love, to me, is a choice, you wake up every day and you choose:
What you want
What you need
Speak your truths to receive
Truths in exchange –
Past what is perceived
Past assumptions, to gain knowings
And to keep Love growing
It’s more than the showings
It’s the clarity in communication
It’s the calm and patience past frustrations
It’s the listening and the stillness –
It’s every message from body to breath

I don’t want to fall for you
Or fall in Love
Falling is falseness, it’s fleeting
I’d rather rise in love with you
In ascension
Without fear and apprehension
I don’t want to sacrifice any part of me to make it work
I want to invest in all of me and all of you
And give gratitude
That we empower one another in self worth

I don’t want to be possessed or bound by Love
I’d rather be Liberated in Loving
I’d rather be Love that is Revolutionary
Love that is Patience
And Presence
And Respect
And Pride
And Honesty, nothing to hide
And Attraction
And Joy
And Truth
In every thing we say, show and do

In Love with you is all of this to me
And there is no place I would rather be.

Everything I Know About Love By Dolly Alderton

I know that love can be loud and jubilant… It can be dancing in the swampy mud and the pouring rain at a festival and shouting “YOU ARE AMAZING” over the band.

It’s introducing them to your colleagues at a work event and basking in pride as they make people laugh and make you look lovable just by dint of being loved by them. It’s laughing until you wheeze.

It’s waking up in a country neither of you have been in before. It’s skinny-dipping at dawn. It’s walking along the street together on a Saturday night and feeling an entire city is yours.

It’s a big, beautiful, ebullient force of nature. I also know that love is a pretty quiet thing. It’s lying on the sofa together drinking coffee, talking about where you’re going to go that morning to drink more coffee. It’s folding down pages of books you think they’d find interesting.

It’s hanging up their laundry when they leave the house having moronically forgotten to take it out of the washing machine. It’s saying ‘You’re safer here than in a car’ as they hyperventilate on an EasyJet flight to Dublin.

It’s the texts: ‘Hope your day goes well’, ‘How did today go?’, ‘Thinking of you today’ and ‘Picked up loo roll’. I know that love happens under the splendour of moon and stars and fireworks and sunsets but it also happens when you’re lying on blow-up airbeds in a childhood bedroom, sitting in A&E or in the queue for a passport, or in a traffic jam.

Love is a quiet, reassuring, relaxing, pottering, pedantic, harmonious hum of a thing; something you can easily forget is there, even though its palms are outstretched beneath you in case you fall.

In My Life By John Lennon

There are places I’ll remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever, not for better
Some have gone and some remain

All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends, I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life, I’ve loved them all

But of all these friends and lovers
There is no one compares with you
And these memories lose their meaning
When I think of love as something new

Though I know I’ll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I’ll often stop and think about them
In my life, I love you more.

She’s Not Perfect By Bob Marley 

She’s not perfect – you aren’t either, and the two of you may never be perfect together – but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can.

She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break – her heart.

So don’t hurt her, don’t change her, don’t analyse and don’t expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she’s not there.

Dance Me To the End of Love by Leonard Cohen 

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I’m gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

Oh, let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone
Let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon
Show me slowly what I only know the limits of
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

Dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We’re both of us beneath our love, we’re both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

Dance me to the children who are asking to be born
Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
Dance me to the end of love

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I’m gathered safely in
Touch me with your naked hand or touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love.

Absolute Beginners by David Bowie

I’ve nothing much to offer
There’s nothing much to take
I’m an absolute beginner
But I’m absolutely sane
As long as we’re together
The rest can go to hell
I absolutely love you
But we’re absolute beginners
With eyes completely open
But nervous all the same

If our love song
Could fly over mountains
Could laugh at the ocean
Just like the films
There’s no reason
To feel all the hard times
To lay down the hard lines
It’s absolutely true

Nothing much could happen
Nothing we can’t shake
Oh, we’re absolute beginners
With nothing much at stake
As long as you’re still smiling
There’s nothing more I need
I absolutely love you
But we’re absolute beginners
But if my love is your love
We’re certain to succeed.

Planning your alternative wedding readings

A barn wedding means you’re not tied to religious readings, so have fun picking anything from song lyrics to film quotes. We’d suggest chatting with your celebrant or registrar first to see how many readings they suggest for your ceremony – as well as if there are any limitations.

Then, you just need to choose who you want to stand up and read during your ceremony. Of course you want to choose people who mean a lot to both of you, but it’s important to also think about who would feel comfortable and confident standing up in front of your guests to read aloud.

Finding the perfect barn wedding venue in Leicestershire

We don’t like to toot our own trumpet too much, but we do think what we have at The Hall Barns is very special. Tucked away in the Leicestershire countryside, our cute barn venue is a great choice for a laid-back festival style wedding – we even have an on-site glampsite for those Glasto-meets-big-day vibes. The best way to get a sense of The Hall Barns is to come and visit yourself. We’d love the chance to show you around our venue space so you can understand why so many couples fall in love with the place at first sight. Click here to book a viewing or to ask our team any questions. We’ll get back to you straight away.